Translation of the article in French by Jacques Rouchaud
I have just heard it this evening on television, on France 2: Christine Lagarde is in the news again.
She will step down as President of the European Central Bank on 7 February 2027, almost nine months before the end of her term. She says she wants “the freedom to engage”. In September, she said that running for the French presidency would be “not a good idea at all”. But her name is circulating, and some already see her as the saviour of France.
Let us look at the facts.
The king of finance: the result is known
In 2017, the French elected Emmanuel Macron, a former managing partner at the Rothschild bank and a former Minister of the Economy. He was presented to us as the man who knew how to count.
At the end of 2016, France’s public debt stood at about 2,190 billion euros. At the end of June 2026, it reached 3,595.5 billion, or 119% of the wealth produced in one year. That is nearly 1,400 billion more in less than ten years. Covid and the energy crisis played their part, it is true. But every crisis was paid for in the same way: on credit.
The empress of finance: the same school
Minister of the Economy from 2007 to 2011, Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund from 2011 to 2019, President of the ECB since 2019: few careers are so prestigious. And yet, between the end of 2007 and the end of 2011, France’s debt rose from 64% to 85% of the wealth produced, including the 2008 crisis.
Knowing how to talk to the markets does not pay off the debt.
What result can we expect?
A debt is also an income for those who lend. According to a mission supported by the French General Inspectorate of Finance, the cost of the debt will rise from 78 billion euros in 2026 to nearly 125 billion in 2030 if nothing changes. That is 47 billion more every year that our hospitals, our schools and our roads will never see.
Handing the keys once again to that world means continuing to look after the financiers, and risking finishing France off.
No solution by magic
In 2025, our public administrations spent 1,714 billion euros against about 1,560 billion in revenue. The shortfall was 152.5 billion, or about 418 million euros borrowed every day. Nearly 9 euros out of every 100 spent are money we do not have.
The main point is simple. There is no magic wand. We must cut spending, and use with precision the money that France and its people really produce.
Every euro must have a purpose, someone responsible for it and a result that can be checked. Spending that serves no purpose stops. No household, no craftsman, no business would survive by living as the State does. The French Court of Auditors itself warns that “all the signals are red”.
Neither king nor empress
Demosciocracy proposes a different way of managing: budgets kept as close as possible to the people, in each territory, no new borrowing, and every euro saved used to pay off the debt. The people decide by referendum. No party, no prince, no king, no empress.
Liberty — Equality — Truth.
Thank you for your comments
👉 demosciocracy.com
✉️ jacques.rouchaud@me.com
Factual references
- Élysée – Career of Emmanuel Macron.
- ECB – Official biography of Christine Lagarde.
- European Council – Appointment of Christine Lagarde.
- INSEE – French public accounts for 2025; public debt at the end of June 2026; debt from 2007 to 2017.
- Court of Auditors – State of public finances, 2026.
- General Inspectorate of Finance – Cost of the debt.
- France 24 and franceinfo – Christine Lagarde’s departure from the ECB.
Mercidevoscommentaires